Journal editors take industry payments, too — in two cases, over $1 million

For the past decade, many medical journals have begun requiring contributors to disclose their conflicts of interest, but a new study finds that many journal editors — who are also doctors — themselves receive hefty payments from industry and most of their journals do a poor job of disclosing relevant policies.

To wit, the study found that, in 2014, half of 713 journal editors, whose payments were reported to a U.S. government database, had received something of value from drug or device makers, and nearly 10 percent had received research funding. While the median general payment was only $11, the range was large — from $0 to more than $2,900. And two editors received more than $1 million in payments.

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